On 'Super-injunctions'

So I've been trying to figure out which side of the super-injunction debate I'm on. If I had to choose, I'd have to say I'm against them, but I have a lot of reservations about the whole thing, although, to be honest, my issues are mostly with the invasive, celebrity-gossip-obsessed nature of today's media and not really with the injunctions themselves.

Do I think the public has a 'right' to know about celebrities' private lives? Not really, no. I'm not going to fight a freedom of the press/freedom of speech campaign based on my right to know who is cheating on their wife with whom. Those kinds of reports are flavour of the month gossip that people will forget about as soon as the next one comes along, but have lasting impacts on the lives of those involved (will she dump him or won't she? More gossip fodder!), including in many cases children, and it's just not something that I'm comfortable demanding some inviolable right to know.

And for the most part, that's the kind of stories these super-injunctions have allegedly been blocking, according to the recent Twitter 'exposure', if it's to be believed. And if that's all they ever were, I probably wouldn't have a massive problem with them; I know celebrities are in the public eye because they chose to be in some way or another, but I don't think that gives the other six billion of us the right to know every single detail about their private lives. But if the super-injunctions are allowed to continue, it's inevitable that at some point someone (a politician, most likely) will attempt to muzzle something that is in the public interest. And the public interest might include things like extra-marital affairs and naughty pictures if there are allegations that, say, taxpayer money was used to pay for hotel rooms or if a politician were being blackmailed. There is no clear line with these injunctions where we can say these things are definitely okay to keep out of the press in the name of privacy, and these things are not. There will always be a grey area and, as a result, I lean towards not setting a precedent of extremely strict privacy laws that are designed to keep anything and everything secret.

I'm curious to see what impact, if any, today's Max Mosley decision will have on these kinds of stories. Presumably super-injunctions have been brought in cases where celebrities have been informed beforehand in one way or another that their secrets are about to be plastered across the front page of the dailies. But if media now know that they definitely have no obligation to inform people before publishing details of their private lives, how many of them will skip seeking comment or confirmation at the source and just go straight ahead with publishing allegations to avoid the chance of the celebrity seeking a super-injunction? I do worry that the prevalence of injunctions may lead to a more irresponsible press, especially among tabloids who are desperate to get a juicy story out ahead of anyone else.

What I do wish is that there was less 'need' for these injunctions in the first place. The public craving for any scraps of information or photos about actors, models, top athletes and their partners is sickening. The culture of gossip and outright invasiveness that pervades the tabloids, websites and even the broadsheets allows otherwise unremarkable people to become Z-list celebrities because of an affair with an actor and Z-list celebrities a few more moments of fame for the same reason. That these people can sell their stories for so much money is indicative of the fact that the papers know these stories sell - big time. And as long as that's the case, reporters are going to continue to dig for the juicy tell-alls and years-old topless photos with little regard for the privacy of those involved. Unfortunately it's the case that privacy rights are ill-defined and weighed not against the public interest, but against how much money is to be made.

In the end, though, the super-injunctions just seem like a waste of time and resources given the fact that their top-secret contents seem to be fairly common knowledge online. If you want to know which footballer allegedly had an affair with which reality TV star, Google and Twitter can tell you, if one of your friends hasn't already. And even if these allegations haven't been published on the front page of the Sun and the Daily Mail, once everyone thinks they know them, the damage to the reputations of those involved is done, unless someone else comes forward and confesses it was actually them who had the affair. Whether the publication of these details online or in foreign media is right or wrong according to privacy ethics is a bit beside the point; until someone can somehow impose and enforce a worldwide privacy law, banning the UK media from publishing something that is already common knowledge is a bit absurd. And it may be this fact, above all ethical questions, that ends up being the game-changer.